1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method of identifying and registering persons, in particular for internet applications, and to an assembly of hardware and software for applying such a method.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
The internet is a fast-growing medium, which, from a communication viewpoint, consists of Top Level Domains (TLDs), internet addresses (Uniform Resource Locators (URLs)), internet sites with information, search engines, users and access providers. Top Level Domains such as “com”, “net”, “org”, “edu”, “gov”, “mil” etc. are defined on the basis of a worldwide open organization structure. The structure of naming is based on internationally standardized character sets. There are also Sub-Level Domains (SLDs) which are country-specific: “us”, “uk”, “nl” etc. The general search engines available are focussed particularly on searching sites by content. The worldwide character and the infinite possibilities in respect of the publication of information and message traffic make it essentially a medium with particularly attractive use potential. It is thought that internet at this moment is at its initial stage. Characteristic of the present situation is that heretofore internet has been designed mainly by engineers and that at the moment the providers and users are located for the most part in industrialized countries. It is expected that the number of users and providers will only increase in the future. Through wider application the internet will also undergo further changes so as to make it more of a user medium with unrivalled possibilities and with a broad, worldwide degree of participation.
Seen from a worldwide viewpoint, there is at the moment quite a low internet participation and a mediocre spread of providers and users. The main causes for this lack of spread, in addition of course to the relatively short existence of internet, are to be found in aspects such as technical possibilities, cost, the anticipated utilization, retrievability, position in respect of for instance competitors and so on. The internet has an essentially worldwide orientation. Powerful options aimed specially at (inter)local and (inter)regional oriented use (other than on SLDs) are lacking. In the present situation on the internet, searching for a URL/domain name is practically only possible via the internet. Within the internet unclear or confusing naming is possible for URLs/domain names, for instance due to more or less unobstructed use of names of general importance and/or significance. It is generally difficult to be directly retrievable as provider on internet on the basis of URL/domain name. Particularly in the case of frequently occurring names it is in fact impossible to register for each applicant a suitable, distinctive and retrievable URL/domain name. The first registration of a URL/domain name by a user/provider can thus result in a great advantage. An additional drawback of a first registration is that third parties often register URLs/domain names on a large scale having as content the name of for instance a well-known personality or company, whereby the obvious URL/domain name in question is taken, and alleged improper use of a name is thereby made in respect of the alleged entitled person. With the current practice surrounding naming of URLs/domains there is a language and character problem. That is, the problem that in written form each language or group of languages employs its own set of letters and characters. Search engines therefore have the limitation in respect of the following: as search result for a search term in a particular language all that is generally obtained is the information found which is available in the same language. National languages hereby acquire a significant influence in all information queries, this while language could be an insignificant aspect of countless queries or need not represent a barrier. The use of URLs/domain names is often difficult because the URLs/domain names are often too long and complicated. The URL notation moreover contains little functional logic. Search engines often have a worldwide orientation in terms of technical possibilities but, due to the manner of searching by information content in a site and the language barrier which thereby becomes manifest, they are often language-dependent in use and not very regionally oriented. In many of the present search engines on the internet there is an inadequately defined relation between query and result. The present search engines for general purposes search by content in a site on the basis of search terms entered by the user. Searching usually proceeds with difficulty and the search results are in many cases mediocre or poor. Through the manner of searching (for details concerning content), the present information provision and the growth of internet (applications) which can be expected in the future, results of queries based on search terms which are not very specific will to an increasing extent produce unusable results. The use of search engines is generally not intuitive. Specific reduction of the search field in a usual, intuitive manner (this may be essential for determined queries) prior to a detailed query is scarcely possible with the existing search engines suitable for general use. At the moment TLDs are defined on the basis of a worldwide, open organizational structure with few restrictions in URLs/domain names and they therefore provide few specific options for use.
The publication by S. Zatti: “Naming in OSI: “Distinguished Names or Object Identifiers?”, Proceedings of the Annual European Computer Conference (Compeuro), US, Los Alamitos, IEEE, Computer Society Press, part-conference 5, 1991, pages 258-262” describes two identification schemes, i.e. Distinguished Names (DN) and Object Identifiers (OI), which are used on a large scale in an OSI environment. The DN scheme is sufficiently flexible and powerful to provide the worldwide need for names. The OI scheme has the possibility of incorporating special criteria imposed by individual requirements. The problem of these schemes is that in the present form they cannot be integrated into each other, thus creating a need to design a system which, within the possibilities of OSI and worldwide networks, provides a uniform naming scheme to identify all types of objects. The publication proposes a uniform solution, wherein both schemes can exist side by side in one environment, solely through a minimal modification in said schemes.
The present invention has for its object to provide an improved device for registering, addressing, structuring and finding persons and data, particularly for internet applications, while retaining the advantages of the prior art but without the limitations of the prior art. Persons should in this context be understood as natural persons, legal persons, organisations or objects. The invention is intended to improve the capabilities of searching and finding these persons on the Internet and for instance to list the results of a conducted search.